THE POWER
Rebecca Jung
“The written word,” he sneered. “What elitist bull. For starters, itās not accessible to everyone; you have to be able to read to experience it. Do you have any idea what the literacy rate is worldwide?”
We at least agreed on one thing: music probably had the ability to influence people more than any other art form. But I was going to have to make a hell of a case if I was ever going to convince him that writing was the second most powerful art.
“People can listen,” I said. “Literature can always be read to them.”
Ian shook his head, not even acknowledging my point. “The visual arts are a much more universal, potent force. Every society, no matter how primitive, expresses itself through painting, drawing, sculpture, visual depictions. It’s one of the most basic human drives.”
“No more so than language,” I argued. “It’s one of our characteristics that identifies us as human beings; weāre hardwired with it. Besides, why is there such a history of fascist or other repressive organizations shutting down newspapers, imprisoning their writers, their poets, for godās sake, if not for the power these writers and their agents hold over the general public?” I added.
He smiled at me condescendingly and then turned to his Mac to resume the layout for the brochure I’d written copy for.
“Show a man -- excuse me -- show a person a picture, show him or her a written page. Now which do you think will have the greater impact?”
Sometimes you have to cut your losses, walk away, and bide your time until a better day. It’s called choosing your battles, and I did a lot of this with Ian.
“You’ve got too much copy here for a six-panel, Deb,” he told me, suddenly all business, his full attention on the Mac. “Can’t you delete something? Edit it so it’s more, you know, succinct? Not as wordy?” He spun around on his chair to face me, grinning. “Let the pictures tell the story.”
“I’ll see what I can do about it,” I said through clenched teeth.
+++
I called him at the office from home Friday morning.
“Ian, I’m on my way out the door for work. Got a minute?”
“Yeah.”
“I want to run some creative copy by you that I’ve been working on in my free time, see what you think,” I said.
“Read away, my dear.” I could hear him settling back in his chair.
“Okay,” I said. “Here goes. This simple dress I wear, fastened with small pearl buttons, the first two unbuttoned because my breasts have spilled out...”
“Yeah?”
“...of the thin clothās confinement, waiting for you to cup them in your hands like water, to kiss them, to drink from them with your mouth and tongue.
“I’ll undress you, to see you naked...”
He groaned into the phone.
“...to taste all of you, to breathe in your scent. I want to press my body into your chest, your stomach, run my hands and fingers down your arms and legs, bury my face in your groin, nuzzle your warm, dark pubic hair and breathe you in.”
“I gotta go,” he said quickly, but he didn’t hang up.
“I’ll ride you, deep, thrusting my pelvis into yours. I want to feel you in me, I want you inside me, in the core of me. Deeper and deeper, so that when you burst inside me my spine will snap off the bed in an electric arc of ecstasy and I’ll feel the hot flood of you wash through me, I want to drown in you. Ian?”
Not a sound on the other end of the phone. Except for what sounded like someone breathing very carefully.
“Well, will you look at the time,” I marvelled. “Gotta go, see you.”
And I hung up.
